Syriac Catholic Church

The elevation in 1656 of Andrew Akhījān (d. 1677) as Catholic bp. of Aleppo
and then as
patr.
in 1662 was the first major attempt to create a ‘Syriac
Catholic’ branch out of the Syr. Orth. Church of Antioch. This
attempt was short-lived but when the Syr. Orth.
bp. of Aleppo Michael Jarweh
(d. 1800) and four other bishops professed the Catholic faith in 1782 in
Mardin, a durable Catholic Church was established. Thereafter,
numerous communities in Syria, Turkey, Iraq, and Palestine joined the Uniate
movement, and an unbroken line of successors followed Patriarch Jarweh.
Among these prelates are the liturgist Jirjis V Shalḥat (d. 1891), the
learned Ignatius Ephrem Raḥmani, (d. 1929), Cardinal
Gabriel Tappuni (d. 1968), and lately Cardinal Mūsā I Dāʾūd,
former Prefect of the Congregation of Eastern Churches. In 1930 in India, a
group within the Syr. Orth. Church of Malabar joined the Roman Catholic
Church. The Malankara Catholic Church that emerged shares with the Syriac
Catholic Church its liturgy but they differ in that the former is
Archiepiscopal while the latter is patriarchal. The Church currently
consists of 3 eparchies (Beirut
[patriarchal], Cairo, USA-Canada), 6 archdioceses (Damascus, Aleppo,
Ḥimṣ-Nabk, Hasaka-Nisibis, Mosul,
Baghdad), 4 patriarchal eparchies (Turkey, Jerusalem-Holy
Land, Baṣra-Gulf, Venezuela), 4 missions (France, Sweden, Australia,
Brazil), and 1 patriarchal procuracy (Rome). The patriarchal seat is in
Beirut, where the cyclical synods of the Church take place. There too is the
Monastery of Sharfeh, which not only contains a precious collection of mss.
and a press, but also includes the Church’s main seminary. The Church owns
other monasteries as well, including Dayr Mār Mūsā al-Ḥabashī in Syria, which contains famous medieval wall
paintings, and the 12th-cent. Dayro d-Mor Behnam in Iraq, an architectural jewel and a true museum of
lapidary art. Syr. Catholic monastic and priestly communities include the
Ephremite nuns in Lebanon, an ascetic community in Dayr Mār Mūsā in Syria,
and the ‘Priests of Jesus the King’ in Iraq, a group that promotes priestly
communal life.